"The Reader": " How far would you go to protect a secret?"

This is the question raised by "The Reader", directed by Stephen Daldry and with the excellent performance by Kate Winslet - an enchanting film about feeling and justice. Yet again we can see, in fact, the impossibility of doing justice in a 'complicated' history and how the less guilty take the responsibility of carrying the burden of the others...

When I left the movie theatre I felt the subject drifted the focus away and, at the same time, I could not forget the image that struck me most which was an image taken in Auschwitz: the thousands of worn out shoes piling up forming walls of shame and death.

"The Meaning of Life" - Andrei Plesu

Mr. Andrei Plesu published an article in Dilema Vechemagazine about the meaning of life. It's never too late to ask ourselves: What's the meaning of my life?

1. "Life tends to have meaning as soon as you ask yourself about its meaning", but without making it the content of our lives;

2. "There is no collective life meaning"; otherwise, we would all go, "in flocks towards a common meaning, without mystery and without face";

3. "The meaning must be found, not manufactured"; we should not mix up the two: meaning and program. A life program is based on objectives (like getting on top in our profession, doing one's duty for the community, etc) but the accomplishment of these leave the meaning of life unsolved, or they might dramatically intensify it;

Have you found your own personal life meaning?

"How about JUST a million?" David Heinemeier Hansson on Startups

My top-talent-IT-specialist sister-in-law sent me a link with David Heinemeier Hansson from Ruby on Rails, talking about how to tackle online business. In a time when we are concerned about how to make much more money and profit, David HH's speech is interesting for each one of us for his simply good-sense ideas:

1. the theory "get a billion or die trying" is fundamentally wrong - why should we waste our lives under this pressure when profit can come more naturally?

2. think more about small problems that people have around you - thousands of people may have the same problem worldwide

3. spend less but more productive time at work - no need to work 12+ hours a day

4. online business is not movie industry - the online field is generous and open to many winners

5. "call your own shots and run at your own pace" - what can be more motivating?

6. the simplest ideas run with professionalism bring you happiness and profit

7. Enjoy "Fortune 5,000,000" - be happy to be part of the low end where people provide solutions to many other people who pay little contributions rather than one huge organization that pays a huge sum of money - why carry the pressure?

Confrunting the Past and...the Future

Ana Blandiana - poet and dissident during the communist regime - and Romulus Rusan, writer and founder of the Memorial of the Victims of Communism and of Resistance in Sighet came to Bacau on Feb 6th to talk about the past, present and future.

Ana Blandiana and Mr. Rusan enchanted the youngsters who did not miss the opportunity to talk and thus confront our very disturbing past in order to understand the invisible threads that wove our history and culture and, more tellingly, understand where we are all heading to... A real essential life lesson!